


misuses of the future tense

by thescrewtapedemos



Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: M/M, Non-Linear Narrative, Prophetic Dreams
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-18
Updated: 2019-03-18
Packaged: 2019-11-23 20:31:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,707
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18156686
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thescrewtapedemos/pseuds/thescrewtapedemos
Summary: It’s a cruel joke to know on his draft day exactly what he’s doing when he looks at Fleury’s face as he’s welcomed to the Penguins team, smiling broad and sly and kind.He isn’t proud that he’s happier than he is guilty.





	misuses of the future tense

**Author's Note:**

> sometimes i think about the 16-17 season and i get really, really sad. if you, like me, also think about the 16-17 season and get really sad, then this fic is dedicated to you. 
> 
> does this follow the actual course of events? GOD no. do i feel any remorse? In general yes but not about this specifically. 
> 
> thank you to moliver and greymichaela for betaing!
> 
> enjoy xoxo

He’s half in love with Fleury before he even meets him.

It could be the hockey. It both is the hockey and it isn’t, but mostly it is. There’s something about Fleury in goal, something magic. Real magic, magic that makes good things happen. Something more magic than whatever the fuck is wrong with Matt.

It’s not just hockey. It’s Fleury’s smile, his shoulders under the hang of his suit jacket, the way his voice slurs up on the vowels in a way that just sounds so familiar to Matt. It’s the way Matt’s heart kicks in his chest when he meets Fleury’s eyes.

The lights bake down on his shoulders, and there’ve got to be at least a thousand people watching even though it’s just the third round, but Matt doesn’t think he could look away from Fleury if he tried. He takes Matt’s elbow in one hand and his hand in the other and shakes it, and Mat knows his own palm must be sweaty but Fleury’s hands are just dry and warm and long-fingered.

He doesn’t say more than _congratulations_ to him, and Matt doesn’t have time to do more than choke out a thank you before he’s being passed down the line of people he needs to be photographed talking to.

It sticks with him though, Fleury’s dark eyes and bright, sincere smile. The quick one-two stab of want-guilt. He’s winded when he tries to smile at the next man, an assistant coach whose name he would feel bad about forgetting if he weren’t already such a mess.

He looks back at the end of the line and Fleury is still watching him. He’s still smiling and he waves a little, down low by his waist where the cameras probably won’t catch it. He’s probably just trying to reassure the nervous new kid. Matt knows he’s being fucking weird but he kind of can’t help it.

So he’s more than halfway in love with Fleury before the end of the day.

He knew it would happen. He saw it in his dreams, after all.

-/-

When he’s a kid he hits his growth spurt early and just doesn’t stop, sprouting up and up like a weed. It hurts, which he’s told it’s supposed to but still blows. He folds it into the soreness of practice and weights and running, makes sure to eat as much as he can. He’s going to be the next Patrick Roy, the next Brodeur, the best goalie in the world and nothing is going to stand in the way.

He spends hours on the ice chasing pucks, hours working on his motion tracking until he’s jerking at phantom movements and when he closes his eyes he sees white, smooth ice spread out from under the skates he’s not wearing.

There are headaches. He doesn’t tell anyone about them, but they keep him up at night a little and he gets weird dreams.

That’s what he thinks when he gets the dream.

The man is smiling queasily at him. There’s something about his horsey teeth and dark eyes pulled into a grimace that’s familiar. He’s all details and an incomplete picture, dreamlike, Matt can’t piece a face together out of it. It’s only eyes and a smile that isn’t much of a smile at all.

They’re in a hallway together, Matt and this man. Institutional cinder block walls thick with paint, fluorescent lights a little dingy with dust. The details of it are sharp enough to cut, sharp like this man isn’t.

“It is what it is, Murrs,” the man says. It’s a lilting Quebecer accent.

“Flower,” Matt’s mouth says, which is a very weird feeling.

It’s not really a smile, what’s on this man’s face. The only thing it has in common with a smile is the teeth. The man who must be Flower turns it on him like a weapon.

“I’ll see you, hmm?” he says and Matt wakes up in the beat right after Flower turns away. The blankets are wet through with sweat.

-/-

Fleury smiles at him and Matt tries to be covert when he wipes his damp palms on his slacks.

It had been easier, at the draft. Easier not to think about his dreams. It’d all happened so fast and he’d been kind of panicking the whole time because it turns out knowing he’s going to get drafted by the Penguins didn’t make it any less _absolutely terrifying_ to wait for his name to be called.

Which sucks. Dreaming about the future should have some kind of benefit.

Fleury had called him over, caught him right as he was leaving orientation with an ostentatious gesture Matt would make fun of him for if he felt just a little less off-balance. As it is, they’re abruptly alone in a cold little hallway and Fleury is looking at him like he knows everything Matt’s thinking right now.

“Hello,” Fleury says. He’s got his head ducked a little so he can look at Matt sidelong through his lashes and he’s kind of stupidly beautiful. It’s hard not to look at how his mouth purses to hide a smile. Matt’s pretty sure he’s making just an absolutely massive fucking fool of himself.

He opens his mouth and he’s proud that what comes out is, “Uh. Hi,” instead of any of the other, worse options.

Fleury snorts at him.

“You’re odd,” he says cheerfully and Matt laughs because, fuck.

“Well, y’know,” he says, half-hysterical. “Goalie.”

Fleury nods. There’s something about the way he’s looking at Matt that says he isn’t fooled. Fleury’s gaze has physical weight and Matt kind of wishes he wouldn’t look at Matt like this because it’s- it’s a lot. It’s a _lot_.

He already jerks off to Fleury kind of way too much.

“Still,” Fleury says and points at him. “If Tanger put you up to pranks I will get you back!”

“No pranks!” Matt says and lifts both hands, all _who me?_

Fleury grins at him, sly and bladed, tongue caught cheekily between his teeth. Matt’s heart is beating so fucking hard and, fuck. He’s grinning too, he’s grinning back at Fleury because this is fun. He’s having fun. Fleury’s _funny_. God, he's so fucked.

“Secrets,” he says, slow and fake-ominous. “I’ll figure them out, Matthew.”

“No secrets, I promise,” Matt lies. There’s no way Fleury will figure them out, anyway. They’re not the kind of secrets Fleury wants to know.

Fleury laughs at him archly. He looks just like he always does in Matt’s dreams and he’s hit with a wave of disorientation, not sure if he’s dreamed this or not. He might have. He might not have. He sometimes isn’t sure what exactly is just dreams. He’s never entirely sure, not until they’ve happened.

“Welcome to the team,” Fleury says.

He’s got his hands in his pockets and his cap on backwards. He's almost as tall as Matt and stands like he's taller. He wears Penguins colors like they’re the only thing he has in his closet, which might actually be the case. Matt isn’t even going to start with them this year and he already has more sweatshirts and shorts and water bottles than he could fit in a second suitcase.

“Thank you,” Matt says, belated. He sounds stupid. He knows he does. Fleury just smiles at him.

“Watch out for Crosby,” he says, “he bites.”

And then he wanders away. Matt waits until he’s out of sight to press a palm to the way his heart is thundering in his chest. There’s the sting of guilt there but it’s easy to push down.

He can’t stop thinking about Fleury’s smile. He’d _rather_ think about Fleury’s smile.

-/-

Technically speaking, he supposes he might be able to change the future.

He would need to renege on his contract. Quit NHL hockey and maybe forgo any future pro hockey, certainly in North America. There might be a future for him in Europe or the KHL, though the idea of playing goalie on Russian ice has him a little _absolutely terrified_.

He loves Flower, but he won’t give up hockey for him. He wouldn’t do that for anyone.

-/-

He gets sent down and it’s kind of a breath of relief. He knows he’s going to get there eventually but it’s _hard_ and he wants the chance to practice, to improve. To be worthy of his future.

It’s also probably good not to look at Flower all the time, even if he guiltily kind of really wants to. His heart keeps racing when he does, for one thing, and he thinks the trainers watching his heart rate monitor are starting to get concerned. For another, he’s pretty sure the way he keeps catching himself staring at Flower is going to start freaking someone out. Start freaking _Flower_ out.

He has some trouble falling asleep in the hotel room they’ve put him up in until they can find him someone in Wilkes-Barre to stay with for the season. The air conditioner keeps rattling and he’s restless from traveling and just, everything.

He dreams he’s standing in the living room of an apartment he doesn’t recognize, shiny and clean and impersonal. The lights are off and it’s dark out, a streetlight shining in the window. There’s a phone pressed against his ear and he’s talking into someone’s answering machine.

“It’ll get better,” his mouth says. “I’ll- I’ll see you when they clear you for visitors.”

Silence. The apartment is empty and entirely silent.

“I’ll see you,” he repeats without knowing why he’s saying it, and then ends the call-

Matt jerks up in bed and chokes for air. His chest is heaving and he’s wet through with sweat, his hair matted to his forehead and neck. The air conditioner is still rattling and he’s still in the hotel. He turns over on his side and clutches a pillow to his chest until his heart stops racing.

-/-

He dreams of Flower’s laughing mouth against his. He dreams that Flower is laughing and kissing him and rubbing their noses together like it’s a game, like it’s something he’s going to win at. He’s clutching at Flower, a hand up the back of his shirt and the other in his back pocket like somehow he’ll get some kind of purchase like that.

He wakes up too fast, sweaty and sticky and uncomfortable. It’s a little depressing how used to it he is. It’s a little disconcerting to hope one of his dreams comes true, as well.

-/-

He starts his first game and Flower is there watching from the bench.

In the game, in the place he goes to in his head where everything’s so sharp and clear and slow, Flower isn’t there. It’s just him and the ice and the puck, and nothing else is real and nothing else matters. But in the breaks in play, when he surfaces for a moment, in the intermissions between the periods, Flower is there. He’s smiling, and clapping Matt on the back.

There’s a moment, Flower’s hand against his cheek in the last moments of the second intermission. No one’s watching, trying to line up, trying to get their equipment settled properly. It’s just the two of them.

“You’re going to win,” Flower says, like he can see the future too.

He loses. Flower can’t see the future, and Matt’s kind of glad about that.

-/-

He watches Flower climb the stage with a queasy smile, watches him pull on the jersey with the wrong number, the wrong colors. The telecast doesn’t pick out the details of his shoulders, deceptively small-looking under fabric sewn to fall over nonexistent pads. The camera and staticky broadcast smooths right over all of it.

Matt is dreaming. He knows he’s dreaming.

-/-

“Brush it off,” Flower says to him fiercely, and Matt looks up in surprise to meet his eyes.

He’s warlike. He looks like he does when he’s in his pads, his helmet, capricious and unsmiling. Matt feels it in his spine, the way he straightens up without thinking about it.

“So what,” Flower says, and grabs Matt by the shoulder. His hand is too tight and it hurts a little and Matt feels his chest expand for the first time. “You let in one bad goal, so what.”

“Hey,” Matt begins weakly. Flower shakes him. The locker room isn’t looking at them but it isn’t not looking at them either. He feels something like déjà vu, but he hadn’t dreamed this. He knows he hadn’t dreamed this.

“You can do better,” Flower says. He believes what he’s saying. “You will.”

“It’s the playoffs,” Matt says dumbly, because he is an idiot but he just- needs this. He needs so much.

“It’s just a game,” Flower says and finally smiles. “Just another game.”

Matt knows what this will be costing Flower to give but he takes the reassurance anyway. He’s selfish, or he’s human and he wants so badly it stings on his tongue, and he just doesn’t know the difference.

Frankly, the locker room echoing with Flower’s voice, something cold and certain in his gut that feels like something to build with, he doesn’t care.

-/-

There’s a first dream.

Flower’s smiling at him. Matt doesn’t know his name is Flower yet.

“We did it!” Matt’s mouth shouts. The room is crowded - a locker room. They’re in a locker room and Matt’s pressed forehead to forehead with this man, all dark eyes and a smile that is anything but trustworthy, a face that’s all unresolved detail. It's crowded, incredibly loud around them.

The Stanley Cup is there. Somehow, it’s something Matt barely notices.

“You did it,” the man says.

That’s the first dream, even though he doesn’t remember it.

-/-

Flower presses the first kiss to Matt’s mouth in a hallway two removed from the screaming riot that’s become of the Penguins locker room. There’s cold cinderblock against Matt’s shoulders and Flower is smiling, smiling, smiling.

“You’re always looking,” he says gently, that liltingly sly Quebecer accent.

“You really do wanna score, huh,” Matt jokes weakly because he can’t catch his breath and Flower’s thumb is running over his hip bone and they just won the Stanley motherfucking Cup.

Flower snorts and rolls his eyes.

“You be quiet,” he says tolerantly but he kisses Matt again anyway.

-/-

He’s dreamed so many little conversations. Sometimes they mean more than Matt expects them to, and sometimes they mean less.

“You’re good,” Flower says. It takes a sickening amount of effort for Matt not to mouth the words along with him.

Matt shrugs. Flower shrugs back.

That’s not new, but it’s a detail Matt had forgotten. The odd déjà vu throws him off a little and he answers belatedly even though he knows the script and he knows his lines and he even means them. The damning weight of the future and knowing the future, he’s realized. Even when he fights it every step of the way it still happens.

“I wish,” he says, and he knew even the first time he dreamed it that it was the wrong thing to say. He tries not to think about the future most of the time, tries not to make wishes about things that he can’t change. It doesn’t do any good.

Flower smiles. It’s real and genuine, because he has no idea what’s coming. What’s going to happen to him. 

“You’re good,” he repeats. “It’s what you deserve! You should enjoy it.”

This is where Matt had woken, last time. He can kind of remember the sweaty sheets, the way his heart had thundered against his ribs. He hadn’t enjoyed it then but he envies it now because there’s no easy escape anymore, it’s just him and Flower and the hallway just feet from a crowded locker room. It’s a miracle no one’s walked by and overheard yet.

“I,” he says, and what he wouldn’t give for a script now.

He wants to tell Flower he loves him. It probably wouldn’t go over well.

“I will,” he says instead. Flower’s smile goes a little sweeter, like he knows how Matt’s struggling to breathe. He probably does know; Matt’s pretty sure it’s written all over his face.

“You deserve it,” he repeats and reaches out to clap Matt on the shoulder. It feels like it jars loose something tight in Matt’s chest. He can breathe again, abruptly. He wants to throw his arms around Flower, bury his face in his bony shoulder and never come up for air.

He wants to get on the ice.

“Win me a game,” Flower tells him, and Matt does.

-/-

Flower is too nice.

His dreams didn’t prepare him for that. They’re abstract mostly, words and snapshots and nothing to do with the real Flower. It’s what makes being in love with him sting so much. Flower is kind. His kindness is a little _fucking rude_ sometimes, but. He’s kind.

If he weren’t, then Matt’s pretty sure he wouldn’t be in love with him. He might hate him, how he haunts Matt’s dreams and the corners of his future like a dogged, skinny Quebecer ghost. He really wishes he could hate Flower. It would make the sick churn of his gut when he stops to think about it too much go away.

He tucks his nose against the tickly short hairs at the back of Flower’s neck and squeezes his eyes shut.

“Cold,” Flower grunts and reaches back to slap at Matt’s hip. Mat can feel how tired he is the slow way he moves. He’s clumsy, leaves his hand against Matt’s thigh for a moment.

“Suck it up,” Matt mumbles back and pulls Flower tighter against his chest. He’s warm and lively and real and Matt’s exhausted, though he shouldn’t be. Flower started, played all but the last period. They won.

Flower sighs at him and lets him do it, settles in his grip with a grumble.

“You did well, today,” he says as Matt’s just about to slip over the edge into sleep. It kind of feels like one of Matt’s dreams.

-/-

Flower takes a puck to the mask and doesn’t come back on the ice. Matt knows the instant Coach walks into the locker room.

“Marc-Andre is out with a concussion,” he says, face tight. Matt looks down at his blockers and clenches his fingers in his gloves.

He knows.

-/-

He goes back to the apartment he hasn’t spent nearly enough time in and stands in the living room and stares out at the night sky. His apartment is so very quiet and empty. He’s always liked being at Flower’s house more.

There should be a word, he thinks, for this. Déjà vu isn’t quite right.

He dials Flower’s cell. It goes straight to voicemail. He knew it would. It’s not like anything about this is at all surprising. Flower’s voice in his ear tells him cheerfully to leave a message and he bites his lip.

“I’m so sorry,” he says. He doesn’t know if this is off-script or not. He’d only dreamed a very little bit of this one-sided conversation. “Flower, Jesus.”

He pauses to breathe for a second. It’s going to sound so weird, if Flower even ever listens to this. He won’t for days, Matt knows that. Concussion protocols. It’s alright though. Flower already thinks he’s strange and there’s no way he’d ever guess the truth.

“It’ll get better,” he says. “I’ll- I’ll see you when they clear you for visitors.”

Silence.

“I’ll see you,” he mumbles and ends the call and drops his phone on the ground and braces his hands on his knees and heaves for air.

-/-

“I think you should maybe not come here,” Flower says. His voice is thin through the phone speakers, taut and barely there like the connection might snap at any moment.

“Oh,” Matt says.

He hadn’t dreamed this. He’d dreamed so very, very many things but not this.

“The doctors say no stress,” Flower says after a moment.

His voice is croaking and hoarse. He sounds awful. He sounds _sick_. It fucking sucks that even though something in Matt’s chest is grinding apart all he can really think about is how badly he wants to be there with Flower. Overwhelmingly all he wants is to be there in the little dark room they probably have Flower in to brush his hair back from his forehead or something equally stupid and sentimental.

He swallows and then swallows again when his throat just clicks uselessly.

“I get it,” he says, when he can. “Let… let me know when you’re good for visitors.”

“Okay,” Flower says after a moment, and then he hangs up and he doesn’t call back.

-/-

He catches Flower after the news breaks. He’s well past used to hearing things about Flower secondhand, these days. He’s almost sure it’ll stop stinging eventually.

He catches Flower in a familiar little hallway, thick grey paint over cinderblock and grimy fluorescent bar lights.

Flower looks at him and Matt knows what he’s going to say long before he says it. It sticks in his throat, bitter and sour. The memory is so old, but the way Flower’s voice cuts as he speaks was always memorable.

“It is what it is, Murrs,” he says, and it guts Matt.

He thinks of changing the script. He thinks of saying something else, but there’s nothing to say.

“Flower,” he says numbly.

Flower smiles at him. Matt thinks inanely that he’s kissed that mouth. He’s watched that mouth give interviews and smile at cameras and charm its way through pranks and he’s never seen it lie so poorly.

“I’ll see you, hmm?” he says and turns away and walks off down the whole awful length of the fucking CONSOL hallway and Matt watches him go and his heart shatters all over the floor.

He stands in that fucking hallway for a very long time. It’s cold. He’s shivering a little in his thin shirt. He hadn’t expected this, hadn’t dressed for it, and what a stupid and incompetent prophet he is, if he can’t even take care of himself when he knows exactly what’s going to happen.

He stares after Flower and can’t stop thinking that any second now he’ll wake up.


End file.
